Overview
- Lawyers across France, who escalated strikes Wednesday, disrupted criminal dockets with mass postponement requests and work-to-rule actions in major courts such as Bobigny.
- The bill would let some criminal cases end through a fast-track guilty plea that requires a single accused, full admission of facts, approval by the prosecutor, and no objection from the victim within ten days.
- Paris adopted a work-to-rule for urgent and non-urgent criminal matters, Bobigny called a total strike including custody hearings, and regional bars in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Avignon, Carpentras, and Tarascon suspended duty services and legal-aid appointments.
- The stoppages are delaying hearings for defendants and victims, with one victim at Bobigny told a domestic-violence case was pushed back by a year, as backlogs there rose from 147 to 193 pending cases since 2022.
- The Justice Ministry defends the measure as victim-focused and time-saving, notes support from many magistrates, and points to Spain’s expanded ‘conformidad’ as a model, while national lawyer bodies formally oppose the reform and plan further action ahead of the Senate review.